Archive for February 2016

I have lived through fifty-seven northern winters. Each year when the sun dips lower and lower along the horizon, and the light slants just so in the birch trees, I feel a longing for color, something to ballast me against the deep days of gray and white and black of winter. I walk the woods looking for the flicker of red feathers when the cardinals are near. I wander the lakeshores at sunset hoping for that pearl-pink just before sunset or a deep blue,

Is photography art? In this day and age of instant photography it is a question we hear a lot.

To me, “Art” is an overarching concept that transcends medium. We talk of the art of sculpting, of dance, of music, of writing. We often talk about it as a noun: “that is art” or “that is NOT art,” but I think it is easier to understand when it is used as an adverb: “artfully.”

For something to be done “artfully” it must display an unmistakable level of mastery.